Saturday, January 10, 2009

Was There Ever A Quest For Relief?

Takashi Saito has signed with the Boston Red Sox. You may remember Mr. Saito as the ex-closer of the Dodgers. I also believe he was a multiple time WWE tag team champion with Mr. Fuji. However, his signing, along with pretty much every other major potential closer on the free agent market, has left the Tigers with little options left in their "quest for relief" as Ian at BYB has put it. One by one, K-Rod, Fuentes, Hoffman, Smoltz, Wood, The Professor and Mary Ann...they've all signed elsewhere while the Tigers have barely been in the running for any of their services. While there's rumors of taking a look at Chad Cordero, Jason Isringhausen, and other guys that suck, I'm left wondering if there ever really was a quest for relief to begin with.Let me explain. Let's assume that the Tigers open the season with a 12 man pitching staff. Here's where we are as of today.SP-Justin VerlanderSP-Armando GalarragaSP-Jeremy BondermanSP-Dontrelle Willis (LH)SP-Edwin JacksonSP-Nate Robertson (LH)SP-Zach MinerRP-Joel ZumayaRP-Fernando RodneyRP-Bobby Seay (LH)RP-Freddy DolsiRP-Kyle Bloom (LH)That's who I assume we'd take up north in April, for better or worse, injuries aside. Now, if we sign a closer (or two relievers as I've wanted), whom do you get rid of? Bloom has to stay on the roster or he gets offered back to the Pirates, so I think he's here to stay unless he has a Nate-like 2009. Seay is the other lefty and isn't going anywhere unless Clay Rapada somehow takes his spot. As for the rest, and I'm not sure about this here, I think Dolsi might be the only guy with options to the minors left. Obviously, I'd like to see Dontrelle or (desig)Nate gone, but that's not going to happen. We owe them too much cash. In fact, scary as it sounds, I can see Nate getting a look as the closer in this group. He's probably not going to start and what else are we going to do with three leftys in the pen?So, was there ever a quest for relief in the first place? Was Double D just making it look like he had in interest in certain guys to keep the fans happy? Was he actually serious when he said the team was prepared to go into the season with Rodney as closer? I'd love to hear other people's opinions on this because the more I think about it, the more I think that it could be true.

2 comments:

Totally agree.. once Smoltz signed outside of Atlanta (granted it was with Boston), I started to feel like DD was sending smoke screens all winter. Seems odd that we didn't get involved in those closers 'seemingly' in our price range.

Totally agree.. once Smoltz signed outside of Atlanta (granted it was with Boston), I started to feel like DD was sending smoke screens all winter. Seems odd that we didn't get involved in those closers 'seemingly' in our price range.

Do Not Take This Blog Seriously.

The only thing I enjoy more than Detroit Tigers baseball is making fun of it and those that write about it. Most things you read here are meant in a humorous way. So do everyone a favor and lighten up. It's a joke. Oftentimes a bad one...

DesigNate Robertson was named after ex-Tiger pitcher, Nate Robertson and my hatred of his performances on the mound. He will be missed.

To those with an open mind and a sense of humor, I welcome you. Lets have some fun.